Tag: mocks

I’m not going to even begin to attempt to hide the fact that I am rubbish when it comes to revision; for my GCSEs I read my English texts the night before each exam, barely picked up a Maths textbook, didn’t even try to try with French, winged Latin, flunked History, glanced maybe twice at my sciences, and tried a bit (the most) with Art. Obviously, it showed in my grades which were, predictably, nowehere near what I know I could’ve achieved.

I think my problem is, and it’s the same for many people, that I was ridiculously clever in primary school; I was that kid who could ace a test in a few minutes and would always move onto the extension work. Because of that I was praised so much so that when I moved to secondary and found myself at a more average level I floundered around, terrified at the prospect of not being top but unable to work to get back there because I’d never needed to try before and so had no idea how to try.

Now, at A-Levels, I’m still in that position. I’m average, perhaps even a tad below it now, and I’m still lost when it comes to studying. It’s not that I haven’t asked for help, it’s just that my brain is rather like a sieve now.

Obviously, this is a realisation that has caused me no end of grief because, hell, the exams I have coming up are ones whose grades are given to my prospective universities, so to say that they’re a big deal is on a whole other level of understatement.

Right now, I’m sitting at my desk having just got up from lying on the floor scrolling through Buzzfeed quizzes and articles on ‘How To Motivate Yourself To Revise’. Shouldn’t the fact that if I don’t study I won’t go to university be motivation enough? You’d think so.

So I suppose the point of this little post is to say to all those other people in the same state as me that you’re not alone! But that that’s not a reason to stay the way we are, because really we won’t get anywhere by Googling motivational inspiration.

Really, I think we need to set ourselves a goal, an achievable one that’s just far enough away that we’ve got to actually try to reach it. For me, that’s getting into a good university so I can move out. For you it might be the same, or different, but whatever it is, focus on it because if you’re anything like me you’ll be kicking yourself in a few months if you didn’t try for it.

So good luck, my fellow perfectionist procrastinators, I know you can do it.